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Show THE SAILING OF THE SHIPS. Everybody doesn't know that those sixteen big battleships which set sail from our Eastern shores on Monday Mon-day last is the greatest armada that ever left a nation's shores in all history, his-tory, but such is undoubtedly the case. There are some oilier things in this connection that everybody is not aware of. One of them is that within with-in the narrow span of a dozen years the navy of the United States has progressed from the eighth in point of tonnage and effectiveness to the second place in the category, being excelled only by Great Britain But for the stubborn it might be said dogged determination of Johnny John-ny Bull to keep his lead just for the sake of keeping it and thereby building build-ing ships that he has no present or prospective need of, we should soon be alongside of him if not indeed first on the lis. And that may come to pass any way, for at the present we have more vessels under actual Bfl construction than he has. It was an event that must be set down in the history of nations, that which took place off Fortress Mon- roc on the 16th of December, 1907 It was a quiet but most effective note of warning to the world that hence- forth the United States is the power of the western sc.is wherever and HI whenever she sees fit to assert her HI supremacy. For let it be remem- bcrcd, as it is already abundantly known, that it is not only in big and HI steel-clad vessels with ponderous HI mechanism' and powerful armament that our nation excels, but also in the stout-hearted, strong-limbed, keen- HI eyed, indefatigable men who comprise B the crews; men who make a score B of 98 in a possible hundred and once B in action never will quit pounding B and thundering until all is silent 011 B the other side. B Suppose we had had such -a naval B equipment when the Maine left our B shores on a friendly visit to Cuban B waters lis it believable she would B have been treacherously blown into B a gnarled and twisted heap of ruins B with a dozen score of the brave souls B who manned her sent into eternity M without warning? And escaping that, fl how could' there have been war with M Spain? That nation's arrogance and M insolent unwillingness to make terms M without -a clash was born of her M mistaken belief that her forces on U the water were superior to ours, a M belief which' had it not excluded the M most important factor in the com- M putation the men would have been M painfully correct; and what a dear M price she paid for that mistake! But M it was for the best, after all. Spain, M with her colonics Treed, her fool H pride humbled into the dust, her ef H fectivc militant force on the sea li- H troyed, and with a big and useful H lesson learned, is doing better than H ever before in her history, while th? H United States well, look at her, just H for a minutel H The sailing of the great licet on H Monday will amount to nothing more H than a breaking in of new craft and H a period of drilling for its men an- H less .sonic other nation sees fit to H make a break in the programme. H This is not looked for nor desired; H but if it comes, heaven help those H responsible for it! Let us' continue H to hope tl.-st the time for putting BJ Japan's insolence away where Span's H vanity has been laid to rest is still H some years ahead. H |
